Acer releases new 16-inch laptop internationally with Intel Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus and Nvidia GeForce RTX 5080
Acer has released a new version of the Predator Helios Neo 16 in the US. To recap, the company unveiled an updated version of the Neo 16 in March alongside a refreshed Helios Neo 16S. A few months later, Acer released the latter in Europe with a 165 Hz OLED display.
Now sold globally, the Helios Neo 16S is said to deliver around twice the battery life of our Arrow Lake HX-based review unit (curr. $1,819 on Amazon). In short, the Helios Neo 16S has pivoted to Intel's more efficient Panther Lake platform at the cost of some raw performance. By contrast, the new Helio Neo 16 has doubled down on maximising CPU performance.
Previously, the laptop could be configured with up to the Core Ultra 9 275HX. Now, Acer has replaced this 24-core processor with the newer Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus; the lesser Core Ultra 7 270HX Plus should be joining later this year, too. Despite containing the same CPU core count and arrangement, the Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus should provide the updated Helios Neo 16 with around 11% higher CPU performance than the Core Ultra 9 275HX, according to our benchmarks.
Additionally, Acer combines this processor with a choice between Nvidia's GeForce RTX 5070 Ti and GeForce RTX 5080 laptop GPUs, which feature 12 GB and 16 GB of VRAM, respectively. Supporting this is a 330 W AC adapter, which also charges a 92 Wh battery. Acer includes a 2.5K and 240 Hz display too. While a 500 nit panel, it utilises IPS instead of AMOLED or OLED technologies.
The new Predator Helios Neo 16 can be picked up in the UK for £3,099 with a Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus processor, an RTX 5080, 32 GB of RAM and a 1 TB SSD. For some reason, the laptop is cheaper in the US when configured with 32 GB of RAM than with 16 GB of RAM. Acer suggests that a Core Ultra 7 270HX Plus variant with the GeForce RTX 5070 (8 GB) should eventually be available for $2,399. Although not available at the time of publication, Micro Center is selling a variant for $100 more with the Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus, an RTX 5070 Ti, 32 GB of RAM and a 1 TB SSD. Please see Acer's website for more details.
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